As a massive fan of survival games, especially those like Subnautica and The Forest that thrive on atmospheric tension, I’m always on the lookout for my next spooky, high-risk obsession, and Steam has long proven to be one of the best platforms for achieving that goal, thanks to the massive number of new indie games it hosts on a regular basis. However, rather than just looking for indie survival games that claim to share similarities with some of the biggest names in the genre, I prefer to play them if I can before clicking that “Add to Cart” button, just to see for myself if it’s something that would keep me invested long enough for it to matter. Well, my latest journey took me to an upcoming Steam Early Access survival game that, within 10 minutes, showed off its potential and had me wanting far more once I was finally done with the demo.
Blind Descent is an upcoming survival game by developer Pokuch, and at the time of writing, it has already amassed a whopping 300,000 wishlists on Steam, which is just downright bonkers. There is a perfectly valid reason, though, and I’m not just relying on secondhand knowledge when I state that. After playing Blind Descent‘s demo myself, I can effectively validate every one of those wishlists by confirming that this is one of those rare survival games that has a bright future ahead of it, so long as it listens to feedback and applies the changes necessary to polish some of its roughest edges.
As a Survival Game, Blind Descent Has the Important Part Down
To me, the most important thing a survival game needs to nail is not its progression systems, combat, or narrative. Yes, those are all valuable elements that will give the experience more substance and a longer tail, but the most necessary element of them all is what makes it feel like a true matter of survival: its atmosphere. For a survival game to feel like a survival game, it can’t just rely on players keeping hunger and thirst meters filled or requiring them to retrieve their lost inventory after they’ve been downed before being downed again. What it needs, even more than mechanics, is a constant, underlying, inescapable tension that informs you of how alone you are in this strange world and how much it wants to subdue you, the foreigner.
Guess the games from the emojis.
Guess the games from the emojis.
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Based on my time with the demo, that is precisely what Blind Descent has going for it, and one of the main reasons why it has been able to garner so many wishlists ahead of its Steam Early Access release. Blind Descent takes place deep beneath the surface of Mars, where what begins as a mission to investigate the disappearance of a pioneer team quickly turns into a fight to survive after your elevator crashes during the journey underground. Rather than waking up in the dusty, barren wasteland most of us probably imagine when we think of Mars, you find yourself stranded inside an enormous subterranean world filled with thick vegetation, alien creatures, violent weather, and an ecosystem that clearly isn’t thrilled about your arrival.
From there, either alone or in co-op alongside up to three other players, you have to gather resources, craft equipment, build a base, and study the strange plants and animals around you while searching for the missing expedition. What makes the premise especially interesting, though, is that survival isn’t limited to better tools and stronger walls, as you can either rely on advanced technology or begin mutating your own body to become better suited to the hostile world slowly closing in around you.
Blind Descent’s Key Features
- UNDERGROUND MARTIAN WORLD – Explore alien jungles, caves, hazardous biomes.
- SURVIVAL CRAFTING SYSTEMS – Gather resources, craft gear, manage essential needs.
- ALIEN LIFE SCANNING – Study creatures, plants, behaviors, and useful materials.
- SCIENCE OR MUTATION – Choose advanced technology or transformative biological abilities.
- BASE BUILDING DEFENSE – Construct shelters, stations, upgrades, and environmental protections.
- DUNGEON CAVE EXPLORATION – Search dangerous depths for resources and answers.
- DYNAMIC CLIMBING TRAVERSAL – Scale terrain using climbing and crafted tools.
- MELEE RANGED COMBAT – Fight creatures with weapons, blocks, dodges, tactics.
- MISSING EXPEDITION MYSTERY – Uncover the vanished team’s fate underground.
- SOLO OR CO-OP PLAY – Survive alone or with three other players.
When I first started playing the Blind Descent demo, I didn’t really know what to expect as far as quality goes. Its trailer made it look interesting, and the fact that it seemingly already had so many people waiting for its official Early Access release made it all the more enticing. However, I never expected to set foot in this strange world and feel so captivated by its beauty while simultaneously terrified at its potential to swallow me whole. Within 10 minutes of playing it, I was convinced that there was far more to this world than meets the eye, and a part of me didn’t want to leave the comfort of the base I began building, simply because I didn’t know what was out there waiting for me.
Most of my time in the demo was spent doing what any survival game veteran would probably do after being dropped into an unfamiliar ecosystem: gathering everything I could carry and hoping at least some of it would keep me alive. I chopped down trees, collected nearby materials, crafted the basic equipment I needed, and eventually built a small but functional base where I could rest, boil water, cook food, and briefly convince myself that I had some control over the situation. Venturing beyond that shelter gave me the chance to scan the surrounding flora and fauna, learn how different resources could be used, and begin investigating the strange corruption spreading throughout the area, which quickly gave the otherwise familiar survival loop an intriguing mystery to push me forward.
I never expected to set foot in this strange world and feel so captivated by its beauty while simultaneously terrified at its potential to swallow me whole.
Of course, any confidence I had managed to build during the day disappeared almost entirely once the sun went down, because Blind Descent becomes exceedingly dark at night, even when you’re carrying a light source. Seeing the silhouette of a creature moving in the distance was sometimes enough to paralyze me, and the constant sounds of wildlife throughout the forest made the world feel alive around me without ever letting me know whether the noise I was hearing belonged to something friendly or something preparing to make me its next meal. Blind Descent clearly isn’t trying to be an outright horror game, but the horror is nonetheless there, especially when nightfall has already left you questioning every shadow and the demo suddenly decides it is time for you to leave your base behind and enter a dark cave filled with creatures, corruption, and no guarantee that you will make it back out.
Blind Descent Still Leaves Plenty of Room for Improvement—But It Is Launching in Early Access, After All
Before getting into any of Blind Descent‘s shortcomings, I think it’s important to remember what I was actually playing here. This was a free demo for a game that isn’t even planning to present itself as finished when it launches, as Pokuch intends to bring Blind Descent to Steam Early Access so player feedback can help guide its continued development. In other words, I don’t think it would be fair to treat every bug, awkward mechanic, or unfinished element I encountered as evidence that the final game is doomed, especially when this demo exists in part to reveal those exact problems. Still, the whole point of releasing a demo on Steam and eventually entering Early Access is to learn what needs attention, and Blind Descent currently has several areas that could benefit from it.
Blind Descent is currently without an Early Access release date, but its developer stated that it “has been undergoing development since early 2019, and our primary goal is to ensure that we enter Early Access with fully established core mechanics.”
The most noticeable problem is how much unnecessary friction can get between the player and the otherwise compelling survival experience. Menus and inventory management can feel awkward, the scanner doesn’t always cooperate as smoothly as it should, and the tutorial occasionally leaves you trying to figure out basic mechanics that probably need clearer explanations. Gathering and building can also become tedious when useful resources are scattered around the map but only provide a small amount of material at a time, while combat currently feels loose enough that landing or receiving a hit is not always as clear as it needs to be. Even the cave sections, which are fantastic at building tension, can sometimes feel longer than the reward waiting at the end justifies, and I would love to see them become as satisfying to explore as they are terrifying to enter.
There are also plenty of technical issues that remind you just how early Blind Descent still is, including performance drops, crashes, strange collision problems, broken interactions, and items occasionally disappearing when moving them around the inventory or crafting with them. The holographic watch could use some restraint as well, because it has a habit of commenting on nearly everything you do and occasionally speaks over scenes that would have been much more effective had the atmosphere been allowed to speak for itself. Blind Descent is at its best when I am alone in the darkness, listening to something move beyond the reach of my light, so the last thing it needs in those moments is an overly talkative AI companion explaining what I can already see. None of these problems erased how much I enjoyed the demo, though, and most of them feel like exactly the sort of issues a responsive Early Access period could gradually iron out.
Blind Descent clearly isn’t trying to be an outright horror game, but the horror is nonetheless there, especially when nightfall has already left you questioning every shadow…
For all the work Blind Descent still has ahead of it, I came away from the demo far more excited than concerned, simply because the part that would be hardest to fix is already there. Its world is beautiful, unsettling, mysterious, and constantly threatening, while its atmosphere made even the simplest trip beyond my base feel like a risk I needed to carefully consider. Menus can be improved, combat can be tightened, technical issues can be patched, and an overly talkative companion can certainly learn when to stay quiet, but creating a world that players genuinely want to explore despite being terrified of what might be waiting for them is something far more special. Blind Descent already accomplished that within my first 10 minutes, and if Pokuch can build on that foundation throughout Early Access, this could eventually become one of the most memorable survival games Steam has seen in quite some time.
Blind Descent is coming soon to Steam Early Access. It is currently available to wishlist and features a playable demo.
